Page 16

“Not his whole face,” Odessa said. “He was cracking some kid over the head with his baton, and I shoved his arm and he hit

himself in the nose. Total freak accident, but the cop didn’t take it well. Bled like a stuck pig. He was like a two-hundred-fifty-pound

linebacker and I’m this skinny girl. But look who’s doing hard time.”

Angela clicked her tongue. “Not the giant white cop, no way.”

“That’s terrible. And the juvie court sent you here?” Mairin’s voice squeaked with outrage.

Odessa nodded. “Judge said I was a wayward girl . The nuns are supposedly gonna set me on the path to reform.”

“You should volunteer to sing in chapel,” Angela said, then turned to Mairin. “You should hear her. She’s fantastic.”

“They don’t like my kind of singing here,” said Odessa. “Too cheerful, I guess. My favorite is ‘Oh Happy Day’ but it’d probably

get me a whack.”

“No talking,” barked a nun, raising her voice over the clamor of the equipment.

“Sister Theresa,” Angela whispered. “Watch out for her. She pulls hair. Eventually, you’ll get to know each one’s mean side.”

“I don’t want to get to know anything about this place,” Mairin muttered.

“It doesn’t take long. Every day seems the same.” Angela’s voice trembled over the words. “Rotrude is the worst. She’s like

the second-in-command to the prioress. When Mother Gerard goes off to a diocese meeting every week, they leave Rotrude in

charge.”

“There was one in the office,” Mairin said. “Sister Bernadette. She seemed... maybe not so awful.”

“Give her time,” Angela said.

“She’s so young and pretty. What’s she doing here?” Mairin asked.

“I heard she came through Catholic Charities as a child,” Angela replied. “Imagine being here as an inmate, and then deciding

to stay.”

“I can’t,” Mairin said. “I can’t imagine it.

” She carefully picked up an unfolded sheet from the bin, her trembling fingers gliding over the soft cotton material.

Placing it on the gleaming metal table at the lip of the surface, she took a deep breath and fed the sheet into the hungry jaws of the calendar roller iron.

The machine roared to life with a rhythmic clanking sound.

The rollers spun and pressed against the sheet, their heated surfaces clamping down on the crumpled cloth.

As the fabric was drawn into the depths of the machine, Mairin kept her gaze fixed on the rollers.

The machine was a beast, devouring the fabric, making a churning sound as it pulled the piece through the heated cylinders.

Then the fabric emerged on the other side, looking brand-new. Odessa brought the pressed goods to a long folding table, and

another girl expertly made a precise square of it. The process repeated itself at four other stations.

A lay supervisor instructed Angela to show Mairin the rest of the operation in the adjacent rooms and halls. There, girls

were assigned to the various tasks—sorting and then washing in big stationary tubs, followed by a rinse. All the just-laundered

pieces were piled in carts and pushed through a low door to the shaking room, where girls operated something called a mangler,

which was a commercial wringer. After being run through the mangler, the goods were hung out to dry in a big yard that was

webbed with clotheslines.

Each station was monitored by nuns and supervisors who shouted orders and never gave a word of encouragement. It was hot,

and everyone was sweating and thirsty, but they were only allowed to go to the drinking fountain with permission. The steam

and fumes made some of the inmates cough, earning them a rebuke.

Mairin noticed two girls who were visibly pregnant. The girls looked exhausted, moving slowly through their chores, their

protruding stomachs getting in the way. One of them paused to rub her back, earning a cuff from a supervisor.

Angela noticed Mairin’s gaze. “Most of ’em go to OLV—Our Lady of Victory—or Father Baker’s, but some stay here.”

Father Baker’s boys. Colm had proudly counted himself one of them.

“What do... I mean, what happens when the baby comes?”

“There’s a charity ward at St. Francis. That’s where they go to have the baby, and it gets placed for adoption. Sometimes

the girl’s family takes the baby to raise, but in that case, they have to pay a fortune to the Good Shepherd and the hospital

to take care of all the expenses. And the girls here come from families that can’t afford to do that.”

“That’s it, then? They simply... give their baby away?” Mairin focused on the girl with the sore back. She looked like any girl at St. Wilda’s, like Fiona or Mairin herself.

“And then they come back here. I saw one girl’s boobs leaking milk like a dairy cow. She said it hurt really bad.”

Mairin thought of Fiona. At least her friend didn’t have to go through the pregnancy in this place.

The workers were hustled out to the yard, where acres of linens and dozens of garments were being hung out to dry. The dry

goods were unpegged and gathered in carts for pressing. Mairin tipped back her head and breathed in the fresh air. In an adjacent

yard, the orchard looked familiar. There was a harvest ladder. She studied it for a moment, wondering if it was tall enough

to get her over the wall.

“Whose things are these?” Mairin asked, taking down a pair of trousers. It felt weird to be handling strangers’ clothes.

“Uniforms, mostly,” Angela said. “And church garments. A few regular clothes.” She hid behind a fluttering sheet and put on

a cool shirt. “Look at this,” she said, strutting around. “It’s from Macy’s in New York City.”

“You should be a fashion model,” Mairin said. “You’re really pretty.”

“I love clothes,” Angela said, taking off the shirt.

“I hate this place,” Mairin said, flinging the pants into a cart. “I’m supposed to be going to school at St. Wilda’s, but

my parents made me come here.”

“You mean you didn’t choose this place?” someone asked in a darkly teasing voice.

Mairin looked around, fearful of being caught talking. But the speaker was another girl. She was Asian but sounded entirely

American, just not with the Fruit Belt twang of the locals.

“Of course I didn’t choose it,” said Mairin. “What do you take me for?”

“I’m being ironic,” said the girl. She wore a kerchief over her glossy hair, which hung halfway down her back like a waterfall.

She had an intense, penetrating look in her eyes, as if she was trying to read Mairin’s thoughts.

“I don’t know what ironic means,” Mairin said. “My name is Mairin, by the way. Mairin O’Hara.”

“Helen Mei. Is it your first day?”

“It is. I hate it here already. I’m going to figure out how to escape,” Mairin said.

“Hmm, good luck with that,” Helen said. “I’ve never seen anyone succeed. The only way a girl gets to leave is if her family

fetches her. Some get to leave when they turn eighteen. Or if a girl gets too sick to stay. Last winter, they took one of

us away because she was coughing up blood, and she never came back.”

“That’s horrible,” Mairin said. “I can’t stay here until I’m eighteen. I won’t survive.”

“This whole place is horrible,” Angela agreed.

“But it’s pizza day in the refectory,” said another girl in a chirpy, cheerful voice. She was small and awkward, with wide,

protuberant eyes and a lopsided grin. Her smock was wrinkled and smeared with food stains.

“That’s Kay,” said Helen. “And Janice with her.”

Janice had a pointy nose and pointy glasses, and she wore her hair in two braids pulled so tight that they stretched her eyes

sideways.

“Pizza. Whoop-de-doo,” said Denise, wheeling her cart close.

“When do we go to class?” asked Mairin.

The other girls looked at one another. “Ooh, you mean English literature and trig-oh-nometry?” Denise asked. “How about we

schedule it between sorting and scrubbing?”

“I guess I know what ironic means now,” Mairin said. “The display outside the main office has a sign for classrooms. What’s

that about?”

Angela and Helen exchanged a glance. “There are a couple of classrooms they have just for show,” Helen explained. “Like, to

show off when somebody from the diocese or the county social service department comes to inspect. The rest of the time, they’re

empty. We’re allowed to read from the scripture at mealtimes, and if we can get hold of a pencil or pen, they let us draw

stuff. The library bookmobile comes once a month. And they let us play games in the yard three times a week.”

“And that’s all the schooling you’re gonna get here,” said Denise.

“Can we not write letters to people?” Mairin asked, thinking of her promise to Fiona.

She had written down the name and address of her friend’s aunt in Bradford, but she’d forgotten it.

Maybe she could send a letter to Fiona’s house in Buffalo and it would somehow get to her.

She wanted to write to Liam, too. He had something called an APO address, and luckily, she’d memorized it.

“Supposedly the nuns encourage letter writing. But who knows if they actually mail them.”

“That’s nuts,” Mairin said. “This is all hunky-dory with the county?”

“A lot of the girls are placed here by the courts.” Denise jerked her head in Odessa’s direction.

“Is that how you got here?” asked Mairin.

“Piss off,” Denise said, and stalked away.

“She seems nice,” Mairin said.

“She’s a bully,” Helen said. “Janice is a snitch, so watch out for her. She thinks the nuns’ll be nicer to her if she tattles.

And Kay is... well, she’s sweet. Kind of simple. I heard some of the lay workers gossiping that her mother was a terrible

drunk and had too many kids, and Kay was the last of them. Some say all that drinking is the reason Kay turned out like this—undersized

and mentally... well, also undersized, I guess.”

“And what about you?” asked Mairin. “Who sent you here?”

Helen’s lip trembled the slightest bit. She shaded her eyes and looked up at the sky. “My parents went to China to see my